Only Very Important Plastics Allowed

Robin, Part 1

Robin was born in Long Beach, “no not California” she would always add. She was from Long Beach, Mississippi and she would have been happy to grow up, find a partner, start a family, buy a little house, and spend her entire life there in Long Beach. Her whole family was from there as far back as any of them could remember and her dad worked hard in the forests (doing something he called “logging” that Robin always feared was more sinister than that) until his cancer diagnosis, one day before the town’s centennial, 20 days before Hurricane Katrina hit.

2005 was a hard year for everyone in Long Beach. Robin felt, though, that it was hardest for her.

Dad’s first oncology appointment at http://themedicaloncologygroup.com/ was stressful – he had spent his entire life thinking death was not the worst thing, thinking suffering was a part of the deal, thinking he was manly and alpha and strong and unwavering. Learning he had cancer, real terminal cancer, shook all of those firmly held beliefs so much that he revealed a man nobody had ever met before. He was weak and wanted help and didn’t have any answers. This man had been defeated by his body.